BRAC Intern, Sharon Kim, Reports from Uganda

My summer internship with BRAC Uganda has given me the opportunity to research issues of gender dynamics and rights violations against girls and women. This has allowed me to travel around to different areas of the country to observe and work with females directly or indirectly involved in the Empowerment and Livelihood for Adolescents (ELA) programs.

Admittedly, the process of engaging in qualitative research has felt a bit like groping around in the dark without a flashlight, which is really appropriate considering that’s quite literally what you end up doing at least once a week here when the power goes out. It’s been difficult not to feel this way as I’ve been out in the field. When you’re trying to get a group of adolescent girls and women to open up to you, it’s a bit of a by-any-means-necessary process to earn their trust. I had to be willing to humiliate myself a bit in order to win over the groups – singing songs on request, embarrassingly poor attempts to emulate the local dances (of which there is thankfully no evidence) – you name it. However, I figured it was a fair trade-off: a bit of my dignity for a bit of their trust.

At the end of the day, it’s been a process about connecting or finding some commonality from which to work. Though I may never be able to go back and aptly express this to the girls and women I’ve been speaking with, I believe we all learned a little bit about what it’s like to stand out in a crowd – unintentionally for me, and perhaps for them, quite intentionally. The fact that I was roasting to a nice, toasty shade of brown didn’t seem to mitigate the fact that my mere presence would scream ODD SPECTACLE HERE in some sort of bright, blinking neon sign over my head. However, for these women who felt overwhelmed by the river of problems they face, which becomes a mere drop in an ocean of others who face them, an opportunity to stand out and be heard turned out to be very welcome.

The process lent a good dose of perspective on the purpose of the work we do in development. The desire for large-scale, systemic change is always there. But, it’s important not to forget how much people, especially these girls and women, want to be acknowledged as unique individuals rather than the sum of the problems they collectively face. I certainly won’t be able to provide that opportunity to everyone. However, gauging from some of the responses I’ve been getting, I hope that I’ve been able to offer some semblance of affirmation to those who were seeking it.